Critical Guidance for Editing a Published Survey

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Qualtrics
Qualtrics CX
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Understanding the Risks of Editing a Published Survey

Once your survey is published and responses start coming in, every edit carries risk. Even a small change can permanently erase or corrupt your data if you’re not careful. Some updates are completely safe, but others can wipe out everything you’ve collected so far. This guide explains exactly which changes you can make without harming your data and which changes you should avoid. Read this before editing a published survey.

Changes you make to your survey will not appear to respondents until you click Publish and complete the approval or republish process. After you publish, only people who start the survey after that point will see your updates.

Anyone who started the survey before you published will not see your changes. If you want them to see the updated version, they must start over.

  • If you sent the survey through email or a personal link, send those people a new link.
  • If you used the anonymous link, ask them to clear their browser cache, open a private/incognito window, or try a different browser to restart the survey.

Note: Any new edits you make will not go live until you publish again.

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Thoroughly Review Steps Before Releasing Your Survey

To reduce the risks associated with editing a survey after it’s published and data collection has begun, it’s important to conduct a thorough review beforehand. Below are several strong suggestions and key considerations to help ensure your survey is ready before it goes live.

  • Walk through your entire survey in the preview link again and again.
    • Review it multiple times to catch anything you missed.
    • Check flow and timing to be sure the order makes sense and the survey does not feel too long.
    • Test all skip and display logic by trying different answer paths.
    • Review spelling, grammar, and overall look and feel.
    • Test the survey on mobile view.
  • Verify embedded data, scoring, and recode values.
    • Check the recode values for any Multiple Answer question types. By default, Qualtrics may export these responses as a single string. If the user needs the data in binary (0/1) columns instead, they should adjust the recode settings now to ensure the export is formatted correctly.
  • Review formatting, and any branding or look‑and‑feel settings.
  • Review the Guide to Creating Great Surveys and Forms for Iowans before finalizing your survey.
  • Review the ExpertReview results to identify issues and recommended improvements.
  • Confirm consent language and instructions are clear and easy to understand.
  • Submit test responses to confirm data appears correctly in reports.
  • Have a colleague perform a full peer review for anything you may have missed.
  • Select a comprehensive review in your approval process path.
  • Use Copilot or Gemini to fine‑tune your questions, simplify wording, confirm logic and forced responses, and clarify instructions.
  • Review Required Questions and Data Checks
    • Before releasing your survey, make sure required questions and data checks are set up correctly. Only mark essential questions as Force Response, since using it too much can cause people to pick random answers or leave the survey. For non‑essential items, use Request Response instead, which gives a gentle reminder without forcing an answer.
    • Also, turn on Custom Validation for things like emails or dates so responses are entered in the correct format.
  • Check Hidden Technical Settings and Post‑Survey Actions
    • Always review all the settings under Survey > Options to make sure your general, response, security, and other important settings are configured the way you intend.
    • Review end‑of‑survey actions and notifications to ensure the final message or redirects work correctly, and confirm that all workflows and email alerts trigger as expected.
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Safe Changes That Will Not Affect Your Data

The following edits will not delete previously gathered survey data:

  • Superficial text edits
    • Examples: Typos, extra spaces, updating punctuation or capitalization
  • Adding questions anywhere in the survey
  • Adding choices to the end of a list of choices

    • Warning: There is one important exception. Drill‑down questions cannot be edited once you’ve collected any responses. If you change the answer choices after collecting responses, all previously collected data will be invalid. This includes any preview or test responses.

      If you need to update a drill‑down question, you have two options:

      1. Make a copy of the survey and update the drill‑down there, so your existing data stays safe.
      2. Create a new drill‑down question with the updated choices and use display logic to hide the old one.
  • Rearranging the order of questions or blocks in the survey flow
  • Editing, adding, and removing recode values
  • Editing, adding, and removing scoring
  • Adding and removing branch logic, display logic, and skip logic
  • Edits to the look and feel
  • Adding new embedded data or embedded data from the contact list to the survey flow
    • New embedded data fields are not applied retroactively. They will only appear for respondents who complete the survey after the change is made.
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Changes That Will Delete or Damage Your Data

The following edits will delete or alter previously gathered survey data:

  • Changing the question type
  • Enabling or disabling Autocomplete for text entry questions
  • Modifying the response requirements or validation of a question
    • Adjusting response requirements or validation during a live survey can be helpful and may improve your data quality. It is important to understand how these changes affect any responses already collected.
      • Adding Force Response to a Live Survey
        • Existing data stays the same. Earlier respondents who skipped the question will still have blank fields.
        • Moving forward, your dataset will include a mix of people who could skip the question and people who were required to answer. This can affect percentages or make early responses look less engaged.
      • Changing Validation Settings (for example, numeric only or email format)
        • Existing data stays exactly as entered. Earlier responses will still show whatever the respondent typed.
        • Moving forward, your dataset will have a mix of entries that do not follow the new rules and entries that do. You may need to clean older data so everything matches before analysis.
  • Do not rearrange answer choices using Copy and Paste. Use Move Up or Move Down in the choice menu instead.
Qualtrics move up or down
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Additional Resources

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